“Poor mother!” he sighed; “she would not value every jewel she possesses as a featherweight against my safety. They must go, I suppose; but oh, what a delight to make the rogues disgorge!”
“Plaguey dark,” said one of the new-comers. “Light enough for what we want to do, my lad. Shut and fasten the door. We don’t want any one to share our bit of luck.”
“No. Just enough for two. It may be weeks before we get such another chance.”
They were evidently well-to-do men, by their conversation, probably officers; and Scarlett bit his lip with rage as he thought of his mother’s watch and chain, and the beautiful set of pearls, his father’s present to her in happier days. Then, too, there was a case with rings and brooches, beside many other elegant little trifles that would be welcome to a plunderer.
Once more the desire to rush out and face these wretches was strong upon him, but a moment’s reflection told him that to do so was to surrender himself a prisoner, and place himself beyond the power of giving valuable information to the general, his father, who might unwittingly come on to his old home and walk into a trap.
“Better lose a thousand times as many jewels,” he muttered, “than that. Let them steal, for I suppose my poor mother would not have placed her treasures in a place of safety.” He listened breathlessly behind the thick curtain, hoping that the plunderers would be quick and leave, and give him the opportunity to escape.
The chance came more quickly than he had anticipated, for it seemed from the footsteps that the men had gone into the inner chamber, leaving him free to slip out.
His hand was upon the thick fold of the curtain, for all was still in his mother’s room, and he was mentally going on tiptoe to the door, when there was a loud yawn from the prie dieu chair close to the bed’s head, and a voice almost at his elbow said—
“Well, what’s it like?”
“Can’t see much; but it seems a cosy little nest, as soft as can be.”